There’s something on your movie…

Maybe it’s the actor in me, but when I’m writing a screenplay, or watching someone else’s movie for that matter, I’m always concerned with the reality of the scene or story. I’m not talking about the willing suspension of disbelief that we all must embrace at times during John McClane’s trials and tribulations, or the obvious unlikelihood of traveling all the way across the country or world and just happening to run into her again in [fill in the blank romcom], but what I mean is the realistic actual presentation of whatever unrealistic story we are being told. In the theater (I’m talking the legitimate theatre), the goal is to convincingly create a fictitious scenario so believable that the audience, humoring themselves and the actors, believes what they are seeing is real. This has carried over to my understanding of creating film.

Namely, I’ve always been bothered by any narrative trick that isn’t pretty straightforward. Freeze-framing and throwing some graphic up for a joke or an I.D. of a character works like magic…in a Looney Tune. In a movie, it’s literally putting an action description from your script into the final on-screen product. I don’t really like voiceovers, I feel like it kind of gives things away a little bit. Spare me with all of the exceptions and instances where that’s exactly the point, I just don’t like it. I know film is a collaboration, but when I’m constantly reminded I’m watching a film because of all these filmy things happening that NEVER occur in real life, it takes me out of the story, which I think should be the point of any movie, as elementary as that sounds. Honestly, I don’t even really like flashbacks, but that’s a personal thing that I won’t attempt to bullshit you into thinking is tied to a more fundamental literary concept or whatever.

But I understand that voiceovers and flashbacks are tried and true staples of film making; sometimes there’s no option because of the length of your story’s timeline or just to add some character to your flick. I’m well aware The Shawshank Redemption is not what it is without Red’s wise words filling in the blanks for us. But my main filmy pet peeve is the addition of onscreen text that the audience sees but is not part of the actors’ world. Diegetic text? Non-diegetic text? Whatever, I barely graduated college. I don’t think there is anything more distracting or disturbing to me. It’s a stylistic choice that is done to emulate…I don’t know, Looney Tunes? Sure, maybe it looks cool, but unless it’s a time card or something, I just think it’s fucking pretentious and a bite off of anyone who has done that in a flick lately who probably bit it off of a really cool music video they saw one time. Call me old fashioned or whatever, but that shit is just annoying to me.

Enter a few nights ago, when I finally saw a great flick, Zombieland . This movie actually has voiceover, flashbacks and the text thing going on, but it doesn’t matter because,…well if you know, you know, if you don’t, go see it. SPOILERS FOLLOW.

The text-on-screen phenomenon used in Zombieland applies to the main character’s standard operating procedure during the zombie apocalypse the film is set in the midst of. Throughout the film, especially early on, his rules of thumb appear on screen while he describes them to us. It is used to two ends, in my opinion: the first, to remind the audience of the significance of the events taking place, the fact that the main character is ALWAYS on alert and ALWAYS obeying the literal rules of survival. It adds, again IMO, to the reality of the situation. If you’re running for your life, your mind is never at rest, never lagging behind, always watchful and alert. After the audience realizes these things are going to continually pop up, without any stylistic or dramatic acknowledgment, they the viewers become more vigilant and aware of the surroundings of the movie. It adds to the “never know what’s next” element of the end of the world; you don’t want to miss any of these because they’re integral to life itself, and also because of their second narrative purpose: they’re fucking hilarious.

The main kid should want to impress the hottie human they’ve come across in the new American Outback, but rule #17, “Don’t be a Hero,” pops up in the background over his right shoulder and he encourages his older comrade to investigate the abandoned souvenir shop first instead. Any other movie, and the squirrely punk would run in guns blazing, but the on screen text keeps us aware of the gravity of the situation as well as adds to the characterization of the main character…you start to believe he has survived this long, because you’re reminded of these rules, as I’m sure he is every waking moment.

Woody Harrelson’s semi-anonymous character believes shit-stomping something fragile every once in a while helps to keep you sane, which is totally true. But after beating an abandoned SUV to bits on a random main street, U.S.A., he limps away, mumbling “I think I pulled something…” In the background — I myself wouldn’t have noticed had my roommate not been cackling loudly — a piece of debris falls off the back bumper of the vehicle. You can barely make it out before it crashes to the pavement and shatters into a trillion pieces, but it reads rule #18, “Limber Up,” one that we’ve already seen earlier on.

And so on and so on. I wish I could give a real review of Zombieland , but that’s what I get for waiting damn near a year to see it, but what I drew from it is this: regardless of your particular tastes in movies, or more specifically, how movies are told, I have softened my stance after seeing it pulled off perfectly. As I said, flashbacks and voiceovers are mere annoyances, I know someday I’ll have to use them, and they’ve been around forever, so no use getting all riled up about them. But Zombieland , and it’s capable director Ruben Fleischer, use one of my greatest narrative pet peeves flawlessly, not detracting from the realness of the story, but adding to both the severity of the circumstances and the enjoyment of the audience. Few films can pull that off using something so straightforward and film-specific. Zombieland is one. I challenge you to emulate its casual use of this technique to make your movie another one.

Oh, it also helps to have Woody Harrelson in it, as well.

But what the fuck would I know, I’m just an actor.